
This effectively doubles the 40Gbps data rate of Thunderbolt 4, taking the capabilities of the connection that much further. The executive accidentally shared a photo that included details of a new type of connection that supports data rates of up to 80Gbps. A while back, Gregory Bryant, Executive Vice President and General Manager at the Intel Computing Group visited one of Intel’s labs where new Thunderbolt technology is being developed. Intel hasn’t officially announced the next generation of Thunderbolt yet, but that doesn’t mean we don’t know anything. A single Thunderbolt port can turn into a multitude of high-speed connections, which means you can greatly expand your PC’s capabilities. That’s why we see some incredible Thunderbolt-based docks with lots of USB ports, Ethernet, display outputs, and even power delivery. The current version of Thunderbolt - Thunderbolt 4 - has a data rate of 40Gbps, and that’s enough to connect two 4K displays at 60Hz, for example. An exception would be Apple’s latest Macs with the Apple M1 chipset, but it’s rare to see other laptops include Thunderbolt. There are plenty of great laptops with both Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4, but almost every single one of them has an Intel processor. Of course, being developed by Intel, this technology is usually exclusive to Intel-based PCs. Thunderbolt connections enable things like plug-and-play external GPUs like the Razer Core X. While it uses the same connector, Thunderbolt has usually offered much higher data rates than standard USB, making the technology very compelling. Initial releases of Thunderbolt use the Mini DisplayPort connector, but Intel switched to USB Type-C starting with Thunderbolt 3.

Thunderbolt is a hardware interface developed by Intel, designed to allow users to connect peripherals to their PCs. While it hasn’t officially been announced yet, Intel has already let some details out, and there’s some information we can infer from previous releases. Thunderbolt 5, as we expect it’ll be called, is already in testing, and it’s looking to be very impressive. Intel’s Thunderbolt interface has long been one of the big draws of Intel-based PCs, and the company is already working on the next version.
